This invention relates to a device for aid in inserting and removing a contact lens, and more particularly, to a device which maintains a light transmitting path therethrough along which path a user may sight during operation.
Various devices have been designed in the past for aiding contact lens wearers to insert and remove contact lenses. Included in such prior devices are those which use a squeeze bulb type holder having a lens receiving cup at one end thereof, with resilient sides which may be manually squeezed together and released to provide a subatmospheric pressure within the bulb to hold the contact lens on the cup. For the most part, such prior devices have had no provision for providing a light transmitting path through the device along which the user may sight to maintain his eye in a desired orientation while operating the device. Those which may have had some provision for sighting have not been of such design so as to be able to maintain a light transmitting path through the device on pressing of opposed sides of the bulb together to evacuate the bulb.
A general object of the present invention is to provide a simple and economically constructed device for aid in inserting and removing contact lenses which overcomes the above set-out objections of prior art devices in a simple and effective manner.
More specifically, an object is to provide a novel device for inserting and removing contact lenses which includes an elongate, hollow tube having a lens holding portion at one of its ends and a light transmitting closure at the other end, with the interior of the device providing a light transmitting path from the lens holding portion to the closure. Opposite sides of an intermediate portion of the tube are flexible toward and away from each other to evacuate a portion of the interior of the tube to produce a subatmospheric pressure for holding a contact lens on the lens holding portion. An elongate, light transmitting shaft extends longitudinally through the intermediate flexible portion to prevent the opposite sides of the tube from being squeezed tightly together, and thus maintains a light transmitting path through the device along which the user may sight throughout operation.